Edna Pearson
Jailed for poisoning her husband. I would guess from some of the ends left dangling that Edna attempts to poison Marlene Warren and Bobbie Mitchell is blamed for it. Possibly also she really has tried to poison her husband, though it seems when he visits her that he is convinced of her innocence. She wins her appeal and is soon released. Uncut Version In the uncut version of the Edna Pearson story it does show that she did, in fact, poison her husband and he tries to get her released believing she was innocent. He even goes on the radio to declare her innocence because of their love "that you can only read about." The reason the courts found her guilty even when her own husband didn't think so is that Edna's first husband died of poisoning. While talking to Marlene, she makes a half remark about her husband being gullible before stopping herself in midsentence. Thankfully for her, Marlene wasn't listening too hard (465). The Tea When her husband visits her, he points out that the oleander bush is so dangerous but has delicate flowers. When she's in the middle of correcting him that it's only the sap that is dangerous, she stops as if she's gotten an idea before picking leaves from the bush. The next thing we see is Edna preparing the leaves as a tea and serving it to Marlene, telling her they were peppermint leaves (466). Marlene later is sick at lock up but is seen walking around and fine the next morning. The Bali Water Next we see her take rat poison from a bait trap when escorted to the storeroom by officer Joyce Barry to pick up some detergent. Edna later puts the rat poison in bali water, again, serving it to Marlene in another attempt to poison her. During the Marie Winter Riot the water is stolen by Frances Harvey and Alice Jenkins who are sick the next morning (467). Marlene gets what's left of the water back while taking the skip out and when Edna sees the bottle only a quarter of the way full, she gets confused because Marlene isn't sick at all. When Marlene is nearly bashed by Frances and Alice for poisoning them, she starts to understand what is happening. She stops Bobbie Mitchell from drinking the water just in time to see the poison floating around in it but when she tries to show Judy Bryant she drops the bottle, breaking the glass and making the poison impossible to see so Judy didn't believe it. The BBQ During the barbecue, Edna gives Bobbie a branch from the oleander bush to turn Marlene's steak with causing the sap to cover the meat. Moments after, she is released on the grounds that evidence given at the trial about her first husband was inadmissible and because of all the publicity, a fair retrial would be impossible (468). Marlene falls ill shortly after and it is discovered that she had been poisoned and when Alice remarks about the bali water, Judy starts to wonder if Marlene had been telling the truth and goes to Ann Reynolds about her suspicions that it was deliberate (469). Neither Judy or Marlene would point the finger directly at Edna because of the no lagging rule so Bobbie ended up being the suspect because it was her who actually cooked the steak. When Judy goes to the women with her suspicions they realize that Edna really was guilty of attempting to murder her husband and she was trying to kill Marlene because she heard something she wasn't supposed to hear. Conclusion The feeling the women get is a disconcerting thought that if/when she tries it again, she will succeed. So they drop the no lagging rule and tell Mrs. Reynolds so she can warn Harry but she cannot take their word for it, even hinting that they are only using Edna as a scapegoat to free Bobbie of the charges. The women mention calling Harry themselves to warn him but feel that he wouldn't believe a bunch of jailbirds. But when Meg Morris finds the oleander skewer that was used on the steak, she concluded that none of the women knew the difference between the plants except for Edna; however, as Joan Ferguson was so eager to remind her, that evidence wouldn't hold up in court. Notes * The plot line for this character is hard to trace as extensive cuts were made after the initial showing, when Emily Perry, an Australian viewer, claimed the story was based on her own experiences. Emily Perry was convicted in 1981 for murder attempt on her husband by poisoning. She was freed later by the High Court in 1982. * After the first two episodes aired, she threatened to sue Grundy for using her life story and so before the rest of the episodes went out, they had to be heavily edited. They even went as far as to cut Vivian Gray's character out of the credits in some (or all?) of them. * Grundy appeared to have supplied Malta's Channel One with the original versions of all seven episodes for showing in March 2000 but the Australian DVD release in 2008 used the cut versions of all the Edna episodes. * A double disc set called "The Edna Pearson Story" was released in the UK in February 2010, making the full versions available on DVD for the first time; however, cut versions were used for the repeat run on 111Hits in Australia in December 2012, even though Emily Perry had died earlier in the same year showing that it was still a sensitive issue. Category:Inmates Category:Females Category:Antagonists Category:1984 Season Category:Mentally ill Individuals Category:Seniors Category:Killers Category:1980s Characters Category:Poisoners Category:PCBH Characters Category:Guilty